🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <Roger_Walker.2xte@cuehere.edmonton.ab.ca>,
C U E Here Sysop <Roger_Walker@CUEHere.Edmonton.AB.CA> wrote:
>In article <CzDpML.L6L@zadall.com> John Bartol (jbart@zadall.com) wrote:
>
>> if the total
>> availability of weapons is reduced, then it makes [CRIMINAL ACTIONS] more
>> difficult.
>
>It will only make it more difficult for ordinary citizens to get firearms.
>There is no lack of available black market firearms, no matter how many you
>take from law abiding citizens.

First, let's analyze this stateme about "it makes [CRIMINAL ACTIONS] more
difficult."  In the USA, lex rex, or law is king.  We are a society of laws.
Some good, some not so good, some bad, and down rit vile.  However, most 
Americans are law abiding citizens who try to live within the laws of the land
Not so with a criminal.  In the old days, back when I was a kid, we called 
them outlaws.  That is, they lived outside the law.  It makes no difference
if you have guns or not, criminals are criminals, period.

However, Roger makes a very good point.  Even if all firearms were banned
tomorrow and taken from the hands of private citizensthe only thing you
have done is disarm the law abiding citizens and not the criminals.  The
black market is so large that I doubt seriously that it will ever be done
away with by this or any nation.  If you have the money, you can buy anything
from small calibre handguns to LAW rockets, from various rifles to artillery
pieces.

The flap over the use of automatic firearms is one that I personally find 
very interesting and enlightening.  You cannot own an automatic firearm in
the USA without having the propelicense and paying the tax on them.  It
takes a lot more than simply walking into a gun shop, filling out some yellow
form, and walking out with an M60.  Yet, consistently, I hear about how
automatic firearms are turning up in the hands of gangs, particularly drug
gangs.  So, how is it that these outlaws argetting their hands on these 
automatic firearms if there are laws on the books that severely limit and 
proscribe the ownership of and the use of such firearms?  In a word--

		BLACK MARKET!!!

I work with street kids.  It is amazing what you can learn from them!  Each
of them knows who to see to buy a gun.  They can buy anything theywant, if 
they have the money for the purchasAnd none of their sources are legal.
So, now think about it for a moment.

You no longer have the right to own a firearm.  You have been completely 
disarmed by the government.  Do you really think that outlaws will obey the
laws that prohibit the private ownership of guns?  Not on your life, because
that is what you are betting when it comes to gun control and gun bans.  And 
when one of these outlaws enters your home, he will know thathere is no
real danger to himself from an armed homeowner who will defend life and 
property.

So, you'll what---call the cops!!  Think again!!  In the USA, in 1982, the 
U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit, held that:

"...there is no constitutional right to be protected by the state against 
being murdered by criminals or madment.  It is monstrous if the state fails
to protect its residents against such predators but it does not violate the
due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendmenor, we suppose, any other
provision of the Constitution.  The Constitution is a charter of negative
liberties: it tells the state to let people alone; it does not require the
federal government or the state to provide services, even so elementary a 
service as maintaining law and order." (Bowers v. DeVito, U.S. Court of
Appeals, Seventh Circuit, 686F.2d616(1982)) 

But let's not leave it there.  Let's look at an example or two.

Even someone repeatedly threatened by another has no entitlement to police
protection until they have been physically harmed!

In 1959, Linda Riss, a New Yorker, was terrorized by an ex-boyfriend, who had
a criminal record.  Over several months, he repeatedly threatened her: "If I
can't have you, no one else will have you, and when I get through with you, no
one else will wnat you."  She repeatedly sought police protection, explaining 
her request in detail.  Nothing was done to help her.

When he threatened her with immediate attack, she again urgently begged the
New York City Police Department for help: "Completely distraught, she called
the police, begging for help, but was refused."  The next day, she was 
attacked: a "thug" hired by her persecutor threw lye (sodium hydroxide) in 
her face.  She was blinded in one eye and her face was permanently scarred.

The Court of Appeals of New York ruled that Linda Riss had nright to 
protection.

Even a person whose life is imminently in peril is not entitled to help.  On
4 Septber 1972, Ruth Bunnell cald the San Jose (CA) police department
to report that her estranged husband, Mack Bunnell, had telephoned her to tell
her that he was coming to her house to kill her.

In the previous year, the San Jose poli, "had made at least 20 calls and
responses to Mrs. Bunnell's home...allegedly related to complaints of 
violent acts committed by Mack Bunnell on Mrs. Bunnell and her two 
daughters."  Even so, Ruth Bunnell was told to call ba only when Mack
Bunnell arriv Some 45 minutes later, Mack Bunnell arrived and stabbed 
Ruth Bunnell tdeath.  A neighbor called the police, who then came to the
murder scene.

The California Court of Appeal held that any claim against the police
department:

"is barred by the provisions of the California Tort Claims Act, particularly
section 845, which states: 'Neither a public entity nor a public employee
is liable for failure to establish a police department or otherwise provide
police protection service, or, if police protection service is provided, for
failure to provide sufficient police protection.'" (Hartzler v. City of
San Jose, App., 120 Cal.Rptr 5 (1975))

Please note that no guns were used by these criminals.  Which only serves to
prove that even when a criminal can't get a gun to use, he will always find
something to use!!  Moreover, the idea that we don't need guns to protect 
ourselves because we have the police to protect us is a pure myth!!  The
police are there to protect the system, not the people!!

Gene